“Its aim is simple: to celebrate the best fiction of our time, regardless of form or genre, and to bring it to the attention of as many readers as possible. Through The Folio Prize Academy, an international group of people who write, review and delight in books, it will discover and promote excellence in writing, encouraging people to put great literature at the centre of their lives.”

The DSC and Impac Dublin longlists

The Sly Company of People Who Care on two longlists, one much longer than the other.

‘It was happenstance I completed reading Pundits from Pakistan, Rahul Bhattacharya’s magisterial account of the Indian cricket team’s tour of Pakistan in the spring of 2004, two days before the recent announcement of resumption of cricketing ties between the two neighbours . . .’

The Sly Company of People Who Care has won the 2012 Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize for ‘a distinguished work of fiction, non-fiction or poetry, evoking the spirit of a place.’

“This picaresque story, funny, tough and romantic, swerves around all kinds of inner and outer landscapes and offers unforgettable vignettes of a host of characters. He has invented a beautiful and original language, mixing street poetry and sharply sensual poetry.”

The Sly Company of People Who Care is shortlisted for the Royal Society of Literature’s Ondaatje Prize, which is for a ‘book of the highest literary merit – fiction, non-fiction, poetry – evoking the spirit of a place’. I used to think the prize was named for Michael; but it’s for his brother, Christopher, explorer, writer, bob-sledder and philantropist.